Overview

Powerpacks are templated groups of widgets that scale graphing expertise as reusable dashboard building blocks. Powerpacks are either preset (created by Datadog, available to all customers) or custom (created by a user, and only available within their organization). For more information on Powerpack best practices, see the Scale Graphing expertise with Powerpacks guide.

Setup

Creating a Powerpack

Create a Powerpack from an existing group on a dashboard:

1. From a dashboard group’s header, click the “Save as Powerpack” icon.
2. Fill out details to make the Powerpack discoverable to your organization.
3. Add tags under “Add Search Categories” to organize your Powerpacks. This allows team members to find the correct Powerpack to add to their dashboard.
4. Choose which filters should be configurable for the users of the Powerpack.

Note: After creating a Powerpack, the original group is replaced with an instance of the Powerpack.

Updating a Powerpack

Changes to a Powerpack sync across all dashboards where your Powerpack is used.

To make changes to the look or layout of a Powerpack:

1. Hover over the header and click the kebab menu.
2. Select Edit Powerpack Layout from the Powerpack Actions menu.
3. Make any desired changes to the Powerpack layout or any individual widget and select Confirm Changes.
4. If this Powerpack is used in multiple dashboards, a prompt opens up to verify the instances of the Powerpack that are affected by this update.

To make changes to the Powerpack Details:

1. Hover over the header and click the kebab menu.
2. Select Edit Powerpack Details from the Powerpack Actions menu.
3. Make changes to the Powerpack info, the search categories, or filter configuration and select Update Powerpack.
4. If this Powerpack is used in multiple dashboards, a prompt opens to verify the instances of the Powerpack that are affected by this update.

Note: You must have edit permissions to make any updates to the Powerpack or to modify the permissions.

Using Powerpacks

Add or remove a Powerpack instance

After you create a Powerpack, you can add an instance of that Powerpack to multiple dashboards.

To add a Powerpack instance to the dashboard:

1. Click Add Widgets to open the widget tray.
2. Click the Powerpacks tab to view available Powerpacks. You can search with text or predefined tags.
3. Click the desired Powerpack to open the configuration for the Powerpack instance.
4. Select filter values and how the filters are controlled.
   • Powerpack filters - the selected value applies to widgets inside the Powerpack instance.
   • Dashboard filters - controlled by dashboard template variables.
5. Click Confirm.

To remove a powerpack instance from the dashboard:

1. Click the kebab menu on the instance header.
2. Select Remove from Dashboard.

Customizing a Powerpack instance

Changes to a Powerpack instance do not apply to other Powerpack instances in other dashboards.

To customize Powerpack instances displayed on your dashboard:

1. Click the kebab menu on the instance header.
2. Select an option from the Powerpack Actions menu:
   1. Edit Display Options: Customize the group header style, display colors, and name.
   2. Detach Instance: Unlink the instance from the original Powerpack.
   3. Remove from Dashboard: Remove the instance from the dashboard.
   4. Edit Powerpack Layout: Customize the layout of the widgets in the instance.
   5. Edit Powerpack Details: Customize the title, description, and associated tags.
3. Choose new styling options for the header, update the group title, or configure the filters used by your Powerpack.
4. Configure the tag values of your Powerpack instance.

Deleting a Powerpack

Only the author of a Powerpack can delete it. After you delete a Powerpack, existing instances of the Powerpack remain intact, but they display an alert indicating the Powerpack has been deleted. To remove this alert, detach the instance and convert it into a widget group.

To delete a Powerpack:

1. Click Add Widgets to open the widget tray.
2. Select Delete Powerpack.

Powerpack permissions

To make changes to the edit permissions for a Powerpack:

1. Hover over the header and click the kebab menu.
2. Select Modify Permissions from the Powerpack Actions menu.
3. Update which users have edit permissions for the Powerpack.

API

This widget can be used with the Dashboards API. See the following table for the widget JSON schema definition:

{
  "background_color": "string",
  "banner_img": "string",
  "powerpack_id": "df43cf2a-6475-490d-b686-6fbc6cb9a49c",
  "show_title": false,
  "template_variables": {
    "controlled_by_powerpack": [
      {
        "name": "host1",
        "prefix": "string",
        "values": [
          "my-host",
          "host1",
          "host2"
        ]
      }
    ],
    "controlled_externally": [
      {
        "name": "host1",
        "prefix": "string",
        "values": [
          "my-host",
          "host1",
          "host2"
        ]
      }
    ]
  },
  "title": "string",
  "type": "powerpack"
}

Further reading

Additional helpful documentation, links, and articles:

Scale Graphing Expertise with PowerpacksGUIDE Save dashboard widgets in reusable groups with PowerpacksBLOG Group WidgetDOCUMENTATION Building Dashboards using JSONDOCUMENTATION